consideration for the interests of other states. Unification and sover-
eignty over all territory claimed as Chinese would be priorities, so once
again for Southeast Asia the South China Sea would be the key indi-
cator. This would seem to be the most likely scenario, if the ‘calculative
strategy’ is abandoned, so what would the implications be for Southeast
Asia?
To begin with, a more assertive Chinese posture towards South-
east Asia would be designed to increase China’s influence in the
region. For fifty years Southeast Asia has been a primary target area for
Chinese foreign policy initiatives. In that time, Beijing has attempted
to forge an ‘axis’ with Indonesia, contained Vietnamese ambitions,
‘saved’ Cambodia from Vietnamese domination, and developed close
relations first with Burma, then Thailand, and more recently with
Malaysia. China has been less successful in winning the confidence of
post-Sukarno Indonesia or the Philippines. Relations with Vietnam
are correct, but hardly cordial, while suspicion of longer-term Chinese
intentions runs deep throughout the region.
Any considerable increase in Chinese influence in Southeast
Asia could only come, however, at the expense of the US and Japan.
In particular, it would require the United States to scale down its
military presence in the region. This is not impossible to imagine.
The reunification of Korea would obviate the need for a continuing
US military presence, either in Korea or Japan (though Japan, faced
with a competitive China and with few friends, might well opt to
maintain its security treaty with Washington). The US has already
withdrawn from continental Southeast Asia, and will not commit
troops there again. US bases in the Philippines have been dis-
mantled, and Indonesia, with pretensions to leadership of its own in
the region, has never been a subservient ally, even during the
Suharto era. If preceded by peaceful reunification with Taiwan, even
an aggressive Chinese seizure of the islands of the South China
Sea might not be opposed by a more isolationist US if the safety
of shipping lanes were to be guaranteed. This is not to suggest that
A Short History of China and Southeast Asia